Growing XYZ is the series where I ask brilliant one person businesses about their definition of success and how they are bringing it to life.
This week is the amazing Isabel Sachs, founder of I LIKE NETWORKING, consultant and speaker extraordinaire. Isabel does SO MUCH cool stuff and I wanted to dig deeper into how she balances running a non-profit organisation alongside commercial work, as well as what successful growth means to her today. Hope you enjoy our convo as much as I did <3
Matilda x
Hello! Please give us an intro into you and your work.
I’m Isabel Sachs — Brazilian-born and 20+ years in the creative industries, founder of I LIKE NETWORKING. ILN helps people in the creative industries build careers with more agency, more connection, and less BS. I run workshops and speak at places like the Roundhouse, V&A Museum, Sony Music, and University of the Arts London. I write a newsletter that curates hundreds of opportunities, shares interviews and tries to bring down barriers for the industries. For the past two years I have also been the lead tutor on the Roundhouse Creative Business Accelerator.
Before all of this I built a cultural agency in Brazil, managed music projects (one got a Latin Grammy nomination), and have basically spent my whole career at the intersection of culture, business, and figuring out how to make creative work sustainable.
I also have a consultancy where I work with founders and organisations.
ILN started as a response to losing your job during a pandemic. At what point did it shift from “I’m solving a problem I’m personally experiencing” to “this is my life’s work”?
I’d push back on “life’s work” — I’m someone who thinks things change fast, especially in the creative industries. We never know what challenge is coming next. I’m just someone who likes to solve problems. That’s how I got into producing the first time, and that’s how ILN started.
It began as a need (mine) during a crisis. A lot of Netflix and crying and Vanderpump Rules! But it kept going because other people needed it too, and kept asking for it. It also opened doors for me that I didn’t expect — connections across different fields, different sectors, different sides of the creative industries that I wouldn’t have had access to otherwise.
I’d say it’s only since last year that I’ve felt more secure in ILN as a platform. But that doesn’t mean things won’t change in the next few years — I’m pretty sure they will. I’m always iterating, always second-guessing. Should we go bigger? Should we go smaller? What do people actually need right now? I think that’s just the reality of being an entrepreneur.
Running ILN as a Community Interest Company (CIC) means you’re legally structured to reinvest in your mission, not extract profit. How does the structure shape your relationship with growth?
The CIC wasn’t a grand ideological choice. I got advice in 2020–2021 when I was receiving a grant from NatWest to run ILN’s second mentoring programme, and registering as a CIC was the recommendation. In hindsight, I think I should have kept it as a limited company with a social impact mission — that would have given me more flexibility.
That said, I’m figuring out what the best structure looks like going forward. The CIC does open doors to grants, but in reality I don’t apply for that many — I find it harder to speak that language. So we’ve been focused on building consistent revenue streams to keep ILN sustainable, and I still run my consultancy and other work as a self-employed person. That’s how I currently balance paying my bills with keeping ILN’s core mission — accessibility, affordability — in check.
I’m thinking about expanding impact and reach, and in those terms, the CIC structure doesn’t hinder us at all. If anything, it’s good for transparency — people can see what we’re doing and what we’re about. It does create constraints, and I don’t know if I’d build it the same way today. But it hasn’t stopped us from expanding, supporting different cohorts, reaching people at different levels. We’ve done a good job of staying true to the mission while still growing.
Now, let me get nerdy!
There’s a book called The Moral Consequences OF Economic Growth that has stayed with me and I I’m also really inspired by Amartya Sen.
Our society is fixated with economic growth, but as we’re seeing that does NOT necessarily equates to greater opportunity, social mobility, democracy and tolerance. Amartya Sen saw development as the ability to lead a life you value (I may be butchering it) But those are things I contend with when thinking about growth. Growth in what terms? Who’s benefiting from it? So, in that sense, being a CIC makes sense.
You’re also running a consultancy alongside ILN. How do you navigate the two modes of commercially driven agency work and the community/mission work? How do they feed each other?
They have a pretty symbiotic relationship, actually. It sounds more confusing than it is in practice, because most people come to me through ILN first. They find ILN, they see the reach, they book me for public speaking or workshops — and from there, the conversation expands. Sometimes that turns into consulting on a specific project, sometimes it means they want to support ILN in a different way. It flows quite naturally.
Having ILN gives me a real understanding of what’s happening in the creative industries and with emerging talent, which makes my consulting work better. And some of the paid income streams for ILN come from consulting clients, and vice versa. They feed each other in both directions.
I am working on making the two voices more distinct, though. ILN has its own voice, and I’ve recently started a separate newsletter that’s just me — more strategic. I read your work A LOT Matilda for that!
You built and sold a cultural agency in Brazil before all of this. What did you take from that experience and what did you consciously leave behind?
That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life, and I wouldn’t change it for the world. I don’t think I would have been able to set it up had I not been surrounded by incredible artists who believed in me — maybe even more than I believed in myself. They really encouraged me to take the leap as a manager and producer. There’s nothing more exciting than seeing an amazing artistic idea come to life and being part of that process.
I learned a lot. Mainly that if you’re going to be your own boss in the creative industries, you need to understand accounting, finances, spreadsheets — the unsexy stuff. My dad jokes that he was the back office of my business. He came with me to every accounting firm. My sister found me an accounting course because I had no idea about any of it. I’m very grateful to my family for that.
I also learned that I should be less reactive and independent. I would take on responsibility for every single thing and struggle with asking for help. What I did take with me was how to work under pressure, how to juggle multiple things, and how to trust the people around you. There’s actually nothing better than working with a team you trust and watching something happen together.
What I consciously left behind was letting a business become my identity. For too long, that company was who I was. When I moved to London I went through a really tough personal crisis — I didn’t know what my value was beyond work. I’m not doing that again!
What does successful growth mean to you today?
This is something I contend with every single day. Right now, successful growth means working a normal number of hours (whatever that is), being able to rest, having systems that function without me, and expanding our reach while continuing to create impact. That’s the goal. We’re not there yet.
There’s a real tension I’m dealing with right now: as ILN grows in reach, it gets harder to maintain the direct relationships with individuals that made it feel like a community in the first place. I don’t have an answer for that yet. If anyone does, let me know!!
That said, I’m really excited about where we’re heading. We’ve been offering paid commissions for writers to cover different creative scenes across the UK and the world. We’re working with more people, changing the format. It’s starting to feel like a mini media company for the creative industries, which is cool.
But growth for me is not growth for growth’s sake. It’s expanding reach while having a sustainable life — paying my bills, sleeping, enjoying my life, having some financial security. I’m too old for 48-hour days, and I’ve done plenty of those. So we’re installing systems, working with a virtual assistant, and I’m reviewing how I offer my consultancy so that side of the business grows sustainably too. It’s all in progress.
Robbie Hoffman, the comedian, once said she was a slow burn in the industry, but she’s happy that she wakes up every day and what she does is write and perform. I think about that a lot. Part of sustainable growth to me is actually spending more time doing the things I like doing than everything else. I always say your work should support your life goals, not the other way around. I’m trying to actually live by that, not just say it.
📨 Broken Growth is an almost weekly newsletter exploring how one person businesses grow creative ecosystems in a world on fire. Written by strategist Matilda Lucy. If you enjoyed reading, share with a friend who would too 😎.
Thank you for the feature!!